Transcript of Pelosi Interview on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher

Contact: Speaker's Press Office,
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Washington, D.C. – Speaker Nancy Pelosi joined Bill Maher on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher to discuss the ongoing efforts to respond to the coronavirus pandemic, including the recently passed interim emergency funding package transformed by Congressional Democrats to provide critical support for small businesses, hospitals, health care workers and a national testing strategy.

Bill Maher. Okay, I think everybody knows my first guest. She's the Representative from San Francisco and the 52nd Speaker of the House of the United States of America. Nancy Pelosi, thank you very much for doing this. Welcome to my game room, and I have many questions for you in these difficult times.

The first one being, everyone seems to agree testing is the way to get back to normality in America, and the most frustrating thing is it seems like it would even help Trump. But he seems to be dragging his feet on this most important issue. Is there anyway Congress can pass their own plan?

Speaker Pelosi. Well, what we passed today, which we just finished passing, is the testing – we have $25 billion in there for testing, but we require that there be a national strategic plan for testing and that we have reporting back, as to how it is impacting all communities – communities of color and diversity in our country. And so it insists on that.

But it – we passed our first bill – this is our fourth bill – all bipartisan. The first bill was March 4th – was called testing, testing, testing. Here we are more than a month and half later, and we still have to pass another bill. It's very hard to understand why they are dragging their feet or whatever – their brains or whatever. Not to realize – they want to open up the economy – test, test, test, contact trace, incubate – isolate. You know – it's so simple. You have to not only test, but trace and shelter in place until the coast is clear.

Bill Maher. Okay, you mentioned that this is fourth bill you've passed. I think the total now is coming up on $2.7 trillion. That's a lot of money, you know, in a very short period of time. I know Congress controls the purse strings. I can't imagine there's much left in the purse. I just don't get it. I don't understand how – I know we can bailout certain sectors, as we have done in the past. I don't know how you can just keep indefinitely writing checks. We were $20 trillion in the hole to begin with. And all world governments, who are already in debt, are doing this. How can the whole world be writing this funny money?

Speaker Pelosi. Well, because it's a matter of life and death. Nobody made as big of a fuss as we did when they passed the nearly $2 trillion tax break for the wealthiest people in our country, 83 percent of the benefits going to the top one percent and a debt that they laid on our kids to pay for in the future.

So, this is more of an investment in the lives and the livelihood of the American people, and we have to think big about that. The more we invest in science and health, the quicker our economy will recover from the pandemic.

Bill Maher. Well, it will recover unless people get wise to the fact we're just writing checks for money that doesn't exist. I mean – what is the point of bailing out banks who are just going to loan back the money that doesn't exist to us again? It seems like it's a house of cards that could, in the end, wind up hurting more people than the disease.

Speaker Pelosi. Well, the point is to keep people working. It is paycheck protection. And so, the point of these bills – this legislation for the – they call it Paycheck Protection Program – is that the small businesses would be able to have some relief. And if they kept their workers on, then they would have debt forgiveness. And that is a very important part of it.

We were concerned when they asked for more money right away. We said, ‘Wait a minute. We want to make sure – we want to see the data.' Data that we have seen anecdotally, not scientifically yet. It's telling us that many low – shall we say – underbanked communities are not getting any of this money. Whether it was women, minority owned businesses, Native Americans, veterans, rural communities, et cetera, were not getting these loans, because they just didn't have banking relationships that were putting them higher up in the line – further up in the line.

And so, it is probably – well, it is an investment. It is stimulus to the economy, hopefully when that comes. It is not anything in comparison to the irresponsibility of a tax cut – almost $2 trillion when you count the interest on the debt – that all of the deficit hawks, fiscal conservatives didn't even give one ounce of thought to.

The fact is, we expect a return on this money. When we invest in food stamps, that's stimulus. When we invest in Unemployment Insurance, that's stimulus. When we give a direct payment, that's stimulus. And hopefully, when we keep these people in their jobs – and that was the point of small business – but also, the assistance to the aerospace industry, the airline industry, like that, the point is they keep the people in their jobs. And therefore, they have paychecks, and therefore, they can – people can survive.

It's a tough time, because their lives are threatened, as well as their livelihood. As well as our democracy, I might add though. We're going to add the money in there for elections, for direct voting –

Bill Maher. Well, the CDC this week, it might come around again in the fall. Can we afford to do the whole thing again? Can we afford to spend this kind of money a second time in one year?

Speaker Pelosi. I think that it should be clear that this is not doing the job that it is set out to do completely, that we may have to consider some other options. Others have proposed a sovereign fund – profits of which go to these unemployed people – or guaranteed income, other things that may not even be as costly as continuing down this path.

But there is a reverence for small business in our country, as the entrepreneurial spirit, the optimism of job creation, wealth creation and the rest. And it's a good place to help people stay in business. But even if they stay in business, because we're giving this loan, which if they keep people employed, they don't have to pay back. Their rent is paid. The utilities are paid. Employees are there. At the end of the time, they still have to have customers. And that's really why we need everybody to resume. That's why we need another bill.

That will be costly, and we call it our Heroes bill. And that's for state and local, but it's not state and local bureaucracy. It's health care workers, police and fire, emergency services people, our teachers, our transit workers, all of the people who are paid for by state and local public sector. They need jobs too, and they, right now, are the ones that are on the front line risking their lives to save other people's lives. And on top of that, they may lose their jobs, because of the loss of revenue to the states.

So, that will be our next bill, and it will be hundreds of billions of dollars as well. States and localities, counties, municipalities, cities – some bigger than small towns, but nonetheless all having responsibility of meeting the needs – heath care needs of coronavirus, but also recognize the revenue loss that they have. And that has to be recognized as a cost of the coronavirus.

So it is – there is more to come. It's not necessarily in the same vein as small business, but it's jobs, jobs, jobs.

So the way we see it is all about keeping people employed, keeping people employed. But that's why we're having – we passed today, I was very pleased, a Select Committee on the Coronavirus to make sure that the money spent is money that is spent for helping people keep their jobs, not enriching shareholders or dividends, bonuses, corporate CEO pay or anything like that. That angers the American people and it's not right.

The American people want their paychecks, whether it is Unemployment Insurance, whether it is direct payment, whether it is PPP, the small business initiative.

And the thing is, they – first and foremost, I should have said, they want these first responders to be protected – the health care providers, the first responders to be protected for what they are doing. They are our heroes. But I think we are unworthy to praise them and thank them unless we are going to support them.

Bill Maher. Okay.

Well, I thank you for doing this.

I hope Trump doesn't steal all that money. I do worry about that. He's done it before.

Speaker Pelosi. That's why we have this committee, to make sure the money is spent to the best – and, by the way, the good news is that the American people are paying attention. They are watching.

And we want – in what we are doing to change, to make change, so all these hundreds of billions of dollars is not a – is not a way to harden the disparity in access to credit that is there, but to melt that down. And that is what the bill that we are passing today strives to do. Thank you for your interest.

Bill Maher. Thank you. I appreciate everything you do, Madam Speaker. And I hope I see you in person very soon.

Speaker Pelosi. And I share your concern about the national debt, a bill that we don't want our children to pay. So we have to grow the economy to make up for it.

Bill Maher. National debt is one thing. I am worried about, you know, the whole thing collapsing and we going into a depression.

But, let's end on a happy note and hope that doesn't happen.

Thank you so much.

Speaker Pelosi. We have to make sure it doesn't and that's why we have to win the election in November.

Bill Maher. Okay. Yes, I agree with that.

Thank you, take care of yourself.

Speaker Pelosi. You too, stay safe please.

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